DAVID M. RELSON, 1948-04-04 ... 2013-09-21

It is with great sadness that we received word in fall 2013, several weeks 

after the fact, of David's passing.  David, besides his professional and 

leisure time projects such as bogofilter, an active archer and cyclist who went 

on longer (100+ mile) bike excusions frequently, passed away on 2013-09-21 in 

Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA, suddenly and unexpectedly after a 74 mile bike ride, 

not far from his family home.  He suffered a fatal heart failure, and although 

he quickly received medical attention, could not be rescued.

For the bogofilter project, which had originally been founded by Eric S. Raymond,

David came onboard in the early days.  Together with Adrian Otto, Greg Louis, 

Clint Adams, and Matthias Andree, a maintainer team had formed, and David was 

_the_ driving force behind bogofilter for more than ten years and did most of 

the coordination behind the scenes, motivating contributors, being a friendly, 

patient and knowledgable user supporter, and wrote c. 2/3rds of the bogofilter 

code.  Bogofilter would not have become without David what and where it is.

David's passing has been and is a loss, for me who considered him a friend, for 

the bogofilter community and for the project.  I consider myself lucky and 

honoured to have worked with him and been something like a friend across 

continents, and remain grateful.

-- Matthias Andree

A public obituary can also be found online (as of 2019-09-08) at

<https://memorials.niefuneralhomes.com/david-relson/3942104/>